covenant breakers

[hindupridemn]

Does anyone know how many covenant breakers there are in the world now? The names of some covenant breakers? How do the teachings of the Orthodox Baha'i Faith, Baha'is Under the Provision of the Covenant, Baha'is Loyal to Jacques Soghomonian, differ from the true Baha'i World Faith? Are there any descendents of Baha'u'llah living who are NOT covenant breakers?

[arthra]

Thanks fo rthe great questions..

For Baha'is a "Covenant Breaker" is someone who does not recognize the authority of the Center of the Faith and this of course has changed over the years. Only the Center of the Cause can designate someone a "Covenant Breaker".... so today that center is the Universal House of Justice elected every five years by the representatives of Baha'i communities around the planet. In the past there were those who opposed Abdul-Baha or Shoghi Effendi.

There are relatively few Covenant Breakers.. I knew of one man about nine years ago who was desiganted as such.

Basically Baha'is are to leave the person alone and not interfere with them in any way.. There are some small groups scattered around and you may have seen some of these groups on the internet.. They are basically failed attempts to divide the Baha'is and set up their own leadership..

If you'd like more information you can read the following history on the subject:

Covenant, The, and Covenant-breaker

UHJ letter: c-breakers.and.remey.html

[BruceDLimber]

Hi!

There are very vew such individuals--perhaps a couple hundred at most. In fact, a fair number of these groups are already extinct (as you'll see if you examine the article about them on Wikipedia)!

Like it or not, the web and internet can make a tiny group seem far more loud and significant than is really warranted.

And in comparison, there are currently about seven million Baha'is!

Best regards, :-)

Bruce

[hindupridemn]

seven million? This must be a conservative estimate. I have heard numbers larger than 10 million. there are 748,000 in the United States, which has the third largest Baha'i population, after India and Iran.

[arthra]

Originally Posted by hindupridemn

seven million? This must be a conservative estimate. I have heard numbers larger than 10 million. there are 748,000 in the United States, which has the third largest Baha'i population, after India and Iran.

I don't believe that's accuarte .. It's more luike 148,000 rather than 748,000 but I appreciate your vision maybe it will be prophetic..

According to The World Almanac and Book of Facts 2004:

The majority of Bahá'ís live in Asia (3.6 million), Africa (1.8 million), and Latin America (900,000). According to some estimates, the largest Bahá'í community in the world is in India, with 2.2 million Bahá'ís, next is Iran, with 350,000, and the US, with 150,000. Aside from these countries, numbers vary greatly. Currently, no country has a Bahá'í majority.[60]

[Mind_Zenith]

Just a point: according to one of the elders of the local community, the followers of Covenant-Breakers are not necessarily Covenant-Breakers. He said they have to be part of the World Baha'i Faith (the non-Covenant Breaker group centred in Haifa) first, and then become a follower, in order to be designated as Covenant-Breaking. (See here for a piece in Bahai-Library.com about this)

So it could be a less in actuality than originally thought.

As to beliefs, if you're still interested, PM me about it: I'm a little cautious about talking about these groups here; but I have researched them out of interest, so I'm versed on the beliefs of these groups.

Hope this helps!

[Thief]

So...
This faith has a prophet... a doctrine...an ordered method of worship?

In another thread, I had the impression that such a belief system placed the doctrine up front....and practitioners were moving toward a common, mindset.

I might ask...is it required to believe in a particular person? set above all others as the prime example or leader of the faith?

[arthra]

The issue of covenant breaking is really a rare event and not a major developement for most Bhaa'is..

It's talked about on the internet.. but then aren't a lot of things.

For Baha'is a Covennt Breaker is someone (once again) who discards the central spiritual authority in our Faith and sets up their own or adopts say someone else as an authority for themselves.. this can only be determined from someone declaring that they are an authority and seek to say recruit followers or divide the Baha'is..

It's quite rare these days. I think I read about a man about ten years ago who became involved and was a covenant breaker.. His wife went along with him on this..

Anyway the families of some of these people have often supported them and so that's why we do not associate with them .. They are left quite alone to do their own thing.

If they wish to rejoin the Faith they appeal to the House of Justice and a decision can be made to admit them back into the Faith.

- Art

[Thief]

So like many other religious practices, there is hierarchy...and consequence when your own rationale finds a point of conflict?

[arthra]

Originally Posted by Thief

So like many other religious practices, there is hierarchy...and consequence when your own rationale finds a point of conflict?

It's not the same thing though "Thief" as simply having a different point of view for Baha'is.

We Baha'is acknowledge there can be many personal points of view.. and it's actually called independent investigation of reality or truth, a Baha'i principle.

When we declare and become Baha'is we acknowledge Baha'u'llah as the Lord of the Age and we also acknowledge Abdul-Baha as His Successor and the Institutions of our Faith.. by signing a declaration of our faith, this is a simple form of what a covenant is.

Someone who goes back on their acknowledgement is like someone who champions another and tries to organize against the order within the Faith and this could be termed a violation of the covenant they made when they first declared.

- Art